"Atmospheric, character-centric historical mystery" - review of THE BURNING GROUNDS

THE BURNING GROUNDS by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker, 2025)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

In the Burning Ghats of Calcutta, where the dead are laid to rest, a man is found murdered, his throat cut from ear to ear. The body is that of a popular philanthropist and patron of the arts. A man, who was, by all accounts, beloved by all. So what could possibly be the motive for murder? 

Though out of favour with the Imperial Police Force, Detective Sam Wyndham is assigned to the case, and finds himself thrust into the glamorous world of cinema when his investigation leads him to a film the victim was funding.

Meanwhile Sam's former colleague, Surendranath Banerjee, recently returned from Europe after three years running from the fallout of his last case, is searching for a vanished photographer, one of the first women in the profession. When he discovers the missing woman is somehow linked to Sam's murder investigation, the two men are forced to work together once again—but will Wyndham and Banerjee be able to put their differences aside to solve the case?

After scooping a host of accolades for his contemporary standalone thriller Hunted - most notably both the 2025 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year and 2025 British Book Awards (aka the 'Nibbies') Crime & Thriller of the Year, Scottish-Bengali author Abir Mukherjee makes a welcome return to his ancestral homeland and the historical mystery series where he first made his name, with The Burning Grounds, a terrific sixth novel in his Wyndham and Banerjee series set in 1920s India. 

Mukherjee does an exquisite job transporting readers through space and time, and soaking us in the atmosphere of times - the place, people, and politics, as the British Raj was still in control but in decline, and India was moving towards eventual independence. You can almost smell the smoke from the burning ghats and feel sweat trickling as we traverse Calcultta (now Kolkata) and beyond with Sam and 'Surrender-not', the duo that give this historical series plenty of heart among the mysteries. 

In The Burning Grounds, both are still recovering from the events and fallout from the previous book, The Shadows of Men, which saw Banerjee framed for murder, imprisoned, and accused of terrorism. It's an uneasy reunion, a few years later, as cases and dangerous circumstances bring the former friends back into each other's orbits. But can they trust each other, after all that has happened? 

At a time when the country seems on the brink of tearing itself to pieces, and they're each roiling through their own self-sabotaging or self-destructive tendencies, two puzzling cases offer some salve. 

Mukherjee crafts a very good mystery tale that is enriched by his great touch for character and setting. There's plenty of intriguing historic details and perspectives to please history buffs, but not too many where they overwhelm or stall the plot. The Burning Grounds is a propulsive tale that will have pages whirring, but it doesn't feel 'thin'; there's a nice mix of depth and detail, of humanity and whodunnit. 

Overall, this is a very good read that will likely please newer readers to the series, while also delivering plenty for long-time fans. Mukherjee has shown with Hunted that he also has a good touch for contemporary tales, but hopefully there's still plenty of mileage left in the investigations and adventures of Detective Sam Wyndham and fellow sleuth Surendranath 'Surrender-not' Banerjee. Recommended. 

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"A pleasing brain-teaser" - review of THE KILLER QUESTION

THE KILLER QUESTION by Janice Hallett (Viper Books, January 2026)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Mal and Sue Eastwood were once the kindly landlords of a local village pub, The Case is Altered. They ran a weekly pub quiz and were well liked by their customers and colleagues alike, always happy to lend a helping hand. But now The Case stands empty, its windows boarded up. What could have happened to Mal and Sue?

Did The Case close because it was failing? Was it because of the body pulled from the nearby river? Or perhaps it had something to do with the quiz? It had always been a quiet affair, five teams of locals battling it out for a small prize pot. Until one day a mysterious new team of outsiders arrived, and started winning every round...

Former journo and British government speechwriter Janice Hallett burst onto the crime (writing) scene during the pandemic with The Appeal, a modern take on classic ‘puzzle-style’ murder mysteries, with an epistolary twist. Told in epistolary style, via letters, emails, and messages, readers were invited to solve the mystery alongside two lawyers looking for ‘the real killer’ among many case documents.

She’s continued the ‘found documents’ format through a string of bestsellers, and now in her fifth novel The Killer Question, it is WhatsApp messages and group texts, transcripts of police recordings, and emails pitching a true crime doco to Netflix that contain the clues, suspects, and red herrings. 

Along with sheets from a weekly quiz night at ‘The Case is Altered’, a local village pub down a quiet country lane run by former coppers Mal and Sue Eastwood. But who killed the man in the orange puffy jacket whose body emerged from the nearby river, after he was thrown out of a quiz night by Mal as a notorious quiz cheat? And who are the Shadow Knights, the mysterious team of seemingly elite quizzers who turn up out of nowhere and start winning every week, upsetting some locals?

With The Killer Question, Hallett crafts another pleasing brain-teaser. While there may be some wee pacing wobbles, and at times the conceit threatens to overwhelm our connection to characters, Hallett deftly brings her mystery all together very cleverly at the end.

This review was first published in a January issue of the New Zealand Listener magazine

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"Full throttle thriller, well written" - review of NOBODY'S HERO

NOBODY'S HERO by MW Craven (Little, Brown, Oct 2024)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

When a shocking murder and abduction on the streets of London leads investigators to him, Ben Koenig has no idea at first why the highest echelons of the CIA would need his help. But then he realises he knows the woman who carried out the killings. Ten years earlier, without being told why, he was tasked with helping her disappear.

Far from being a deranged killer, she is the gatekeeper of a secret that could take down the West, so for years she has been in hiding. Until now. And if she has resurfaced, the danger may be closer and more terrifying than anyone can imagine.

So Ben Koenig has to find her before it's too late. But Ben suffers from a syndrome which means he can't feel fear. He doesn't always know when he should walk away, or when he's leading others into danger...

While I've really enjoyed some of MW Craven's excellent crime novels starring DS Washington Poe and civilian analyst Tilly Bradshaw - last year's The Mercy Chair was one of my top reads of 2024 - I hadn't read Fearless, Craven's then-standalone thriller that introduced Ben Koenig, a former US Marshall turned ghost of a man; a man who couldn't feel fear in the way normal humans do. 

So I went into Nobody's Hero, the sequel, not knowing quite what to expect. Overall, it was a highly compelling, page-whirring read. A little different in style - more full-throttle thriller with a shade less character development or layers compared to the Tilly and Poe books, while still being well written. 

And involving huge stakes. Save the world kind of matters, compared to Poe's more local investigations. Speckled too with memorable, if at times over-the-top, characters. Echoes of 007. 

The reappearance of the woman Koenig helped vanish ties to 'the Acacia Avenue Protocol'. In a CIA safe is a list of four names. Koenig is the only one still alive. But he has no clue what the Acacia Avenue Protocol is, or why he's on the top secret list. At first appearance, the nomadic Koenig also doesn't seem like the kind of operative to task with such a mission. But he knows that if the woman has resurfaced then something must be very, very wrong. Sent to London to pick up the trail, Koenig gets sucked into a globe-trotting, action-packed quest taking him from Scotland to New York to Nevada. While dodging or dealing with some very dangerous individuals, including a cabal of corrupt cops, and a peculiar hitman. 

With Nobody's Hero, Craven crafts a master class in action thrillers: lots of intensity, lots of movement, high stakes, interesting characters, an intricate plots and some wonderful set pieces. Koenig is an intriguing hero - even if he feels like nobody's idea of a hero - and the surrounding cast, including frenemy Jen Draper, add extra colour and intrigue. Other than blowing the budget with some spectacular set pieces, Nobody's Hero would likely translate very well to the screen. 

For now though, at least we can all enjoy a ripsnorter of a read. 

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"An original, intricate mystery" - review of THE TWYFORD CODE

THE TWYFORD CODE by Janice Hallett (Viper, 2022)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Forty years ago, Steven Smith found a copy of a famous children's book, its margins full of strange markings and annotations. He took it to his remedial English teacher, Miss Isles, who became convinced it was the key to solving a puzzle. That a message in secret code ran through all Edith Twyford's novels. Then Miss Isles disappeared on a class field trip, and Steven's memory won't allow him to remember what happened. 

Now, out of prison after a long stretch, Steven decides to investigate the mystery that has haunted him for decades. Was Miss Isles murdered? Was she deluded? Or was she right about the code? And is it still in use today? Desperate to recover his memories and find out what really happened to Miss Isles, Steven revisits the people and places of his childhood. But it soon becomes clear that Edith Twyford wasn't just a writer of forgotten children's stories. The Twyford Code has great power, and he isn't the only one trying to solve it.

Former journalist and British government speechwriter Janice Hallett burst onto the mystery writing scene during the pandemic with The Appeal, a modern take the classic ‘crossword puzzle’ style murder mysteries, with an epistolary twist. Told via letters, emails, and messages, readers were invited to try to solve the mystery alongside two young lawyers looking for ‘the real killer’ among all the documents in a case. 

Hallett’s fascinating second novel, The Twyford Code, continues her ‘found documents’ approach; this time readers are given semi-accurate transcripts of audio recordings aging ex-con Steven Smith has made on an old iPhone given to him by his estranged son. Looking for redemption, or perhaps just purpose, Steven tries to find out what happened to his remedial English teacher forty years before. Miss Isles had vanished after an unauthorised field trip to visit the countryside haunts of Edith Twyford, a maligned and rather forgotten children’s author whose old-fashioned mysteries may have contained a secret code to solve a real mystery, along with their racism, sexism, and xenophobia. 

Was Miss Isles disappearance linked to the Twyford Code? 

Shadowy figures seem determined to stop Steven, who cajoles some old classmates into the hunt, with mixed success, and is joined by young librarian Lucy for what becomes a dangerous mission entwined with wartime secrets and London gangs. But how much can we believe?  

Hallett deftly keeps readers guessing throughout an entertaining tale. The error-speckled audio transcripts may take readers a while to adjust to, but overall work very well to give voice to characters and a different sheen to the suspects/clues/red herrings nature of a classic mystery. 

The Twyford Code is an original, intricate mystery. A few pacing issues, perhaps, and at times the conceit threatens to overwhelm the story or our connection to characters, but Hallett brings it all together brilliantly at the end. A very good read.

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"A fresh take on the Bond universe" - review of QUANTUM OF MENACE

QUANTUM OF MENACE by Vaseem Khan (Zaffre, 2025)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Q is out of MI6 ... and in over his head. After Q (aka Major Boothroyd) is unexpectedly ousted from his role with British Intelligence developing technologies for MI6's 00 agents, he finds himself back in his sleepy hometown of Wickstone-on-Water. 

His childhood friend, renowned quantum computer scientist Peter Napier, has died in mysterious circumstances, leaving behind a cryptic note. The police seem uninterested, but Q feels compelled to investigate and soon discovers that Napier's ground-breaking work may have attracted sinister forces . . . Can Q decode the truth behind Napier's death, even as danger closes in?

Award-winning author Vaseem Khan is trying something new. The creator of two terrific mystery series set in India – one historic, one contemporary - and the first-ever non-white Chair of the esteemed Crime Writers Association, in his latest quaffable novel Khan veers into Ian Fleming territory.

Quantum of Menace is an authorised novel in the James Bond universe. Not starring 007; instead, the former head of the British Secret Service’s R&D department, aka Q Branch.

Recently evicted by a new M from his longtime role arming Bond and other agents with all sorts of gadgets, Major Boothroyd, aka Q, travels back to his hometown of Wickstone-on-Water following the mysterious drowning of a childhood friend. Did brilliant quantum computer scientist Peter Napier kill himself? While the local police don’t seem interested, Q is compelled to investigate.

But is he just distracting himself from being put on the career shelf in middle age? Or from his own painful history he left behind in Wickstone-on-Water, decades ago?

Quantum of Menace is a highly engaging, cosier take on the Bond universe, packed with dry humour alongside plenty of intrigue. Khan deftly crafts a fascinating, reimagined Q who is neither the legendary Desmond Llewelyn’s onscreen version from the 1960s-1990s, nor the more recent Ben Whishaw portrayal from Daniel Craig’s 007 films. Instead, a richly drawn character with his own backstory. A desk and lab warrior for Queen (now King) and country, who suddenly finds himself ‘in the field’. What would 007 do? Does that even matter, given Q’s differing set of special skills?

Khan crafts an absorbing, page-whirring tale where the shadow of the famed spy is often present, and there are plenty of nods to Fleming’s oeuvre and the films. While Bond may have favoured Aston Martins, Q has his own eye-catching vehicle, a lime green Caterham. Plus an inherited dog named Bastard, a robot companion called Honeypenny, and tricky relationships with old friends and family in Wickstone-on-Water. The Prodigal Son returns, causing plenty of trouble.

A fascinating read and fresh take on the Bond universe. Very good.

[This review was first published in the Fall 2025 issue of Deadly Pleasures magazine in the USA]

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"An atypical amateur sleuth" - review of HELL'S BELLS

HELL'S BELLS by Jill Johnson (Black & White, 2024)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Eustacia Rose's life is beginning to return to normal: she is back teaching at UCL and her relationship with Matilde is blossoming. But when a man is found dead with a needle in his neck, that fragile peace begins to crumble. Eustacia finds a painting of herself with a syringe next to her neck and discovers that there are other people who seem to know more about the killing than they are letting on.

The threat around Eustacia only increases as a PhD student begins to stalk and harass her to gain access to her poisonous plant collection. After Eustacia continually refuses, he contacts a lab that is illegally selling synthetic plant toxins but turns up dead shortly after. As the body count rises, Eustacia has no choice but to investigate the deaths in earnest.

But murders aren't the only thing on her mind as interactions with a new detective cause tensions with Matilde that Eustacia has no idea how to resolve. What's more, run-ins with a mysterious white-haired women are making her recall long-buried memories. Eustacia must solve the mysteries of her past and this case if she wants to escape from this toxic situation unscathed.

Eustacia Rose is not your typical amateur sleuth. When we first met her in Devil’s Breath (published as The Woman in the Garden in the United States), she’s prickly, awkward, a disgraced professor of botanical toxicology hiding away from the world while tending a rooftop garden full of poisonous plants and regularly spying on the comings and goings of her attractive neighbour. A gloriously eccentric loner who’s as much a mystery herself as the crimes she gets caught up in. While her captivating first outing was a BBC Between the Covers pick and dual Ngaio Marsh Awards finalist, it did feel like Eustacia Rose’s story deserved to bloom for more than one season.

So it’s great to see her back in Hell’s Bells, the second mystery from Brighton UK-based Māori storyteller Jill Johnson. This time Professor Rose has returned to teaching at University College London, only for a sudden death that looks like a possible poisoning and a stalker-ish PhD student with eyes on Eustacia’s poisonous plant collection to upturn the life she tries to keep well in order.

When the student also turns up dead, Eustacia feels compelled to investigate.

Johnson, who used to run a leading UK comics store (and later studied for a degree in horticulture), has crafted a wonderfully unusual heroine. Blunt yet unintentionally hilarious at times, fearful yet brave, Eustacia and her relationships with others, often botanically categorised, deliver a fresh feel to the intriguing mystery storylines. A very good read that cements Eustacia Rose as one of the more interesting series characters to appear on the crime and thriller scene in recent times.

This is a growing series (a third, Belladonna, will be published in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand later in 2025) that will delight classic mystery fans, and those who love quirky, eccentric detectives..

[This review was first written for Deadly Pleasures magazine in the United States]

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"Masterfully draws us into a twisting, sordid tale" - review of NOTES ON A DROWING

NOTES ON A DROWNING by Anna Sharpe (Orion, 2025)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Alex knows she risks getting fired from her law firm if she takes on another unpaid case, but when she hears Rosa's desperate voice at the other end of the phone, she knows she has to the body of Rosa's shy teenage sister, Natalia, has been dragged, lifeless, from the Thames. Alex can't help but think of her own missing little sister. She knows how a lack of answers can eat you alive.

Kat has worked hard to become Special Adviser to the Home Secretary, and is eager to finally put the dark and tragic part of her past behind her. But when she discovers a series of cover-ups, she begins to wonder whether her seemingly perfect new boss could be involved. Then she she's shocked to discover a letter that raises worrying questions about a girl found drowned in London... Natalia.

There are complex and painful reasons for Alex and Kat not to work together, but when it becomes clear that there are powerful people involved in Natalia's death, and that other girls are at risk, Alex and Kat must overcome their differences to find answers. Will they save the girls and discover the truth? Or will the high-powered players in this game stop Alex and Kat for good? 

Readers looking for a superb thriller that offers characters that’ll make you care and a propulsive narrative threaded with some very disturbing real-life issues should rush to read Notes on a Drowning, the first contemporary tale from British lawyer and author Anna Sharpe, who’s previously written several excellent historical crime and Gothic novels as Anna Mazzola.

In Notes on a Drowning, ‘Sharpe’ masterfully draws us into a twisting, sordid tale of legal intrigue, power and corruption. Already starting to fray due to workplace and personal pressures, determined lawyer Alex is roped into more pro bono work – the bane of her boss’s life, who is trying to keep the firm afloat and needs fee-paying clients. It seems a simple if frustrating request from a pal: could Anna act for the family at an inquest into the drowning in London’s famed Thames River of Natalia, a teenage immigrant from Moldova. A tragic accident fuelled by partying, alcohol and drugs, say the police and others. But resolution isn’t so simple for Natalia’s family, and soon enough the facts and official story don’t add up for Alex, either. Or is she just projecting the trauma and suspicions raised by her own younger sister’s disappearance in Japan, many years ago? A mystery still unsolved.

Past and present collide when Kat, an ambitious special advisor to the British Home Secretary who is trying to forget her own history, becomes involved after stumbling across documents with troubling information that contradicts what she’s been told. But can Alex and Kat trust each other, let alone dig into the truth behind Natalia’s drowning, when many powerful people want the case closed.

While ‘Anna Sharpe’ may be a new name to crime readers, the author has already proven herself a strong storyteller with several terrific historical and Gothic tales, and Notes on a Drowning may take her to an even higher level. It’s an excellent modern-day thriller powered by taut storytelling, several fascinating characters, lots of intrigue, fears, and tough issues. A cracking, if disturbing, tale.

[This review was first written for Deadly Pleasures magazine in the United States]

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

Jack Reacher, PG Wodehouse, and Mumbai slums: an interview with Ajay Chowdhury

Kia ora and haere mai, welcome to the 240th instalment of author interview series, 9mm. Thanks for reading and sharing the 9mm series, and Crime Watch in general (and my work elsewhere) over many years. I've had a lot of fun talking to lots of amazing crime and thriller writers and bringing their thoughts and stories to you.

You can check out the full list of of past 9mm interviewees here. What a line-up! With lots more fun to come. Thanks everyone. If you've got a favourite crime or thriller writer who hasn't yet been part of the 9mm series, please let me know, and now I'm back on deck more fully, I'll look to make that happen for you. We've got several interviews with cool crime and thriller writers from several different countries 'already in the can' that will be published soon, so lots to look forward to in the coming weeks and months.

Today I'm very pleased to welcome to 9mm an exciting newer voice in crime writing, Ajay Chowdhury, a tech entrepreneur and theatre director who was born in India and now lives in London where he builds digital businesses, cooks experimental dishes for his wife and daughters and writes through the night.

Chowdhury won the first Harvill Secker-Bloody Scotland prize (effectively a search for new, underrepresented voices in British crime writing), for the beginnings of what became The Waiter. Disgraced former Kolkata detective Kamil Rahman is waiting tables at a Brick Lane restaurant owned by family friends. When a birthday party for his boss’s friend ends in murder, Kamil is arm-twisted into an unofficial investigation alongside Anjoli, his boss’s precocious daughter. 

The series, which is in development for television, continued with The Cook, which delved into homelessness, The Detective, entwined with government surveillance and AI, and most recently The Spy. But for now, Ajay Chowdhury becomes the latest author to stare down the barrel of 9mm. 

9MM INTERVIEW WITH AJAY CHOWDHURY

Who is your favourite recurring crime fiction hero/detective?

Probably Bernie Gunther, from the Philip Kerr series. I just think following his life from mid 1930s Germany to the 1950s how he changes, everything he's been through, it's absolutely fantastic. And that was kind of my inspiration for when I knew I was going to get to do a second or third Kamil Rahman book, is, you know, I'd love to be able to follow the guy's life. 

What was the very first book you remember reading and really loving, and why?

I read a huge amount when I was a kid, and certainly the Enid Blyton books are the ones that absolutely grabbed me, the Famous Five. But the one that really showed me good writing was PG Woodhouse. I mean his language, I'd read nothing like it. Anyone who can write a line like "he wasn't disgruntled, but neither was he gruntled", that is really good, right?

Before your debut crime novel, what else had you written (if anything) unpublished manuscripts, short stories, articles?

I was very lucky to have written a children's novel which got published in 2016, Ayesha and the Firefish. I'd been telling my kids that little story at bedtime, and I wrote it, then a friend of mine said, I know a publisher, an editor at Penguin. I just got lucky there as well. They sent it, and this was Penguin India, and they said, Yeah, we'll publish it. Then later it got adapted to become a musical in LA and San Francisco - though I didn't write the musical. 

Outside of writing and writing-related activities (book events, publicity), what do you really like to do, leisure and activity-wise?

I'm a huge bridge player. So I play bridge three times a week online. Weekends I'm normally playing a competition online. So I absolutely love playing bridge and then the usual other stuff, you know, travel, eating, cooking. 

What is one thing that visitors to your hometown should do, that isn't in the tourist brochures, or perhaps they wouldn’t initially consider?

I would count Calcutta [now Kolkata] and Bombay [Mumbai] as my hometowns, as I lived in both places. But if I take Bombay, where I have some great memories, this is going to sound a weird thing to say, but visit Dharavi, the biggest slum in the world. My next book is about it, but I went for the first time in January with my wife, and it's an extraordinary place. It's a million people, in pretty much one square mile. And it's factories, it's people living there. It's a complete ecosystem. And it's an extraordinary place to visit, and they do tours of it, which make me feel a little bit bad, because it feels slightly like poverty tourism, but it's an extraordinary place. And the tour guide we took, all the money goes back into the community. 

If your life was a movie, which actor could you see playing you?

I'm a five foot, two inch Indian guy from Mumbai, so I think it would have to be the guy who plays Jack Reacher in the Netflix show [Alan Ritchson]. It'd be pure wish fulfilment. Not Tom Cruise though, that'd be too easy for him to do. But it would be cool to be played by someone six foot six with arms like potato sacks. That's my dream.

Of your writings, which is your favourite or a bit special to you for some particular reason, and why?

Well, it would have to be The Waiter, because it's completely changed the direction of my life. So,  winning the competition and then having them say that, listen, we want more of these books, completely changed my life. I mean, I would not be sitting here next to you at this crime writing festival, Chiltern Kills, if I hadn't won that competition. So yeah, it would have to be that. 

What was your initial reaction, and how did you celebrate, when you were first accepted for publication? Or when you first saw your debut story in book form on a bookseller’s shelf?

So, seeing in a bookshop for the first time. We didn't celebrate it as such, but my wife and I were in Daunt Books in Hampstead, and The Waiter was sitting not on the shelf, they actually had it displayed on a table. And so my wife photographed me in front of it, and then she sneakily took it to the window and put it in the window, photographed me in front of the window, then put it back. So that was very special. The one thing that's never happened so far, and hopefully will sometime, is I have seen someone reading any of my books in the wild, yeah, that would be cool, I'm still waiting for that.

What is the strangest or most unusual experience you have had at a book signing, author event, or literary festival?

Well, I mean, a guy came up to me today in the book signing after our panel saying he just finished reading The Detective and how much he absolutely hated the female character [ed note: Kamil's ex-fiancé Maliha, not Anjoli] ... he told me how much he hated her, how he felt she was completely unnecessary, and didn't understand why I put her in the book. So that was a bit controversial, and a story that quickly comes to mind! 

Kia ora, Ajay, we appreciate you having a chat with Crime Watch. 

"Dark issues and delicious writing" - review of THE SPY

THE SPY by Ajay Chowdhury (Harvill Secker, 2024)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Kamil Rahman is working for the Metropolitan Police when he gets the call from MI5. They've received intelligence of a terrorist plot, and it's Kamil they need. Posing as a disaffected cop, and working once again in Anjoli's beloved restaurant, Kamil infiltrates the cell. From London he is sent to Kashmir, a place he visited with his parents when he was younger. But his allegiance becomes blurred when he finds himself face to face with an old nemesis... 

I’ve been an unabashed fan of tech founder and CEO turned crime writer Ajay Chowdhury’s moreish mystery series starring disgraced Kolkata detective Kamil Rahman since the first outing, The Waiter (2021), which as an unpublished novel won the Bloody Scotland-Harvill Secker Prize for new voices. In that first book, Kamil was eking out a new life as a waiter at Tandoori Knights, a friend’s Indian restaurant in London’s Brick Lane, before murder intervened, and he was arm-twisted into undertaking an unofficial investigation alongside Anjoli, his new boss’s precocious daughter.

My only trouble with Chowdhury’s books is that, in among the dark deeds leavened with plenty of humour and heart, every time I read one I’d become so damned hungry, due to the food references!

As the more-ish series has grown, Kamil has returned to official policing with London’s famed Met Police. Although he perhaps got more respect even as berated waiter in Tandoori Knights. In The Spy he’s recruited by MI5 to try to infiltrate a dangerous terrorist cell. Playing the role of a disenchanted copper, exiled back to the Indian restaurant. Meanwhile some things haven’t changed, including Kamil’s complicated, stuttering, friends or maybe more relationship Anjoli, who once again gets drawn into amateur sleuthing as she starts to investigate the kidnapping of a teenage boy. 

As Kamil’s discoveries lead abroad, into the brutality and suffering of the long-running Kashmir conflict, he and Anjoli both face grave danger. Stakes are high, personally and politically. 

Once again, Chowdhury deftly crafts an engrossing, highly readable tale that delves into some of the darkest issues facing society, while providing plenty of light through the humour and heart of the characters, and some of the events. It's a tricky balance, but Chowdhury deftly pulls it off, delivering another cracking tale in what's become a really wonderful series, and a great addition to the genre. 

The Spy is delicious crime and thriller fiction, on all fronts. 

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

"Underlines Billingham's status as one of modern crime fiction's greats" - review of THE WRONG HANDS

THE WRONG HANDS by Mark Billingham (HarperCollins, 2024)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Unconventional Detective Declan Miller has a problem. Well, two problems. First, there's his dead wife and her yet-to-be-solved murder. He really should stop talking to her ghosts...

Second, and most pressing, a young man has just appeared on his doorstep with a briefcase . . . containing a pair of severed hands. Miller knows this case is proof of a contract killing commissioned by local ne'er do well Wayne Cutler—a man he suspects might also be responsible for his wife's death. Now Miller has leverage, but unfortunately, he also has something that both Cutler and a villainous fast-food kingpin are desperate to get hold of.

Sprinkle in a Midsomer Murders-obsessed hitman, a psychotic welder, and a woman driven over the edge by a wayward Crème Egg, and Miller is in a mess that even he might not be able to dance his way out of. 

When I look back on my reading days before I began reviewing crime and thriller fiction for various publications and judging crime writing prizes in several countries over the past fifteen or so years, my favourite crime series were probably Michael Connelly’s Bosch books, James Lee Burke’s Robicheaux, and the gritty Tom Thorne series by Mark Billingham (after loving Sherlock Holmes, the Hardy Boys and Agaton Sax as a kid, Poirot as an adolescent, and Alex Cross and Kay Scarpetta as a teen). 

Last year, Birmingham-born storyteller Billingham tossed readers a bit of a googly (or a change-up, to put it in US sporting terms), with The Last Dance, which introduced his first new series protagonist in more than two decades. Despite also being a British police detective, the rat-loving, ballroom dancing widower DS Declan Miller is very different to Tom Thorne. And the series has a very different tone, as Billingham returns to his stand-up comic roots. The Last Dance was brilliant, a hilarious and heartfelt novel with a one-of-a-kind sleuth. So how does the sequel fare? 

In short, The Wrong Hands underlines Billingham’s status as one of modern crime fiction’s greats. 

Fumbling foxtrots, irreverent humour, and policing slapstick and serious are all on the menu again in this superb sequel that may have readers laughing out loud in some passages and emotionally engrossed in others. The cops in Blackpool, a crumbling place recently voted (in real life) as the UK’s worst seaside town, think they finally have crime boss Wayne Cutler bang to rights, only for a sting operation to be upturned by a couple of local larrikins. Cue the Keystone Cops music. When a young man turns up on DS Declan Miller’s doorstep with a briefcase containing severed appendages, Miller realises he may finally have the upper hand – pun intended – to catch those behind the murder of his wife, dance partner, and fellow detective Alex. Not that he trusts the official police investigation. 

So with heavy metal-loving, motorbike riding Detective ‘Posh’ Xiu, alongside a menagerie of pals and contacts, Miller tries to follow some tricky steps and not put his foot in it for investigations professional and private, while hoping not to get voted off life’s dancefloor, permanently.

In The Wrong Hands, Billingham expertly delivers another fantastic read, full of grin-inducing characters on both sides of the law. Where there were touches of gallows humour in his earlier books, the DS Miller series offers guffaws and belly laughs. It could translate brilliantly to the screen, and in whatever form, we’ll have to hope there’s lots more to come from dancing detective Miller.

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

First Impressions Friday: THE WAITER by Ajay Chowdhury

Kia ora and gidday, welcome to the very first instalment of a new semi-regular series here on Crime Watch. With 'First Impressions Friday', we'll regularly on Fridays revisit the first novels of some of my favourite authors and crime fiction series and characters.

Though, in fairness, this is something of a twist on something I did a few times back in 2014-2015, where I and other crime critics discussed the first appearances of some of our favourite crime fiction series characters. We may revisit some of those characters (eg Longmire, Miss Marple, Tom Thorne) along with fresh looks at both the first appearances of other series characters I love in crime fiction, or just debut novels of other authors, series or not.

Today, we're kicking things off by revisiting the recent beginnings of a fresh and exciting new voice and very welcome addition to our crime and thriller landscape, with The Waiter, the first novel in the Kamil Rahman series from India-born tech entrepreneur and London theatre director turned crime novelist Ajay Chowdhury.

Before I dive into the storyline and my thoughts on The Waiter, a wee bit of background. I originally became aware of Chowdhury and his first crime novel after he won the first Harvill Secker-Bloody Scotland prize, which was effectively a search for new, underrepresented voices in British crime writing. The competition, open to BAME authors (Black, Asian, and minority ethnicity), required Chowdhury and others to submit 10,000 words of a manuscript and a synopsis of the whole novel.

As I discovered, when I interviewed him for a feature in the Weekend Herald (my home country's biggest newspaper - paywalled, sorry) ahead of his debut's publication, the idea of someone in a London curry house solving crimes had niggled at Chowdhury for many years, though it evolved from Miss Marple-like cosy amateur sleuthing by a Bangladeshi chef to a grittier tale involving a disgraced Kolkata detective, Kamil Rahman, effectively exiled from his homeland and working as a waiter in Brick Lane, while Chowdhury was entering for the Harvill Secker-Bloody Scotland prize. 

Chowdhury, a tech entrepreneur who’s been founder or CEO of several massively successful start-ups (whose values grew to nine-plus figures and were sold to the likes of Apple and Microsoft), including Shazam, thinks the idea behind The Waiter stuck with him for more than a decade, for two reasons. 

“One was the feeling that in a restaurant, as a waiter or chef, you get to see so many people,” he told me back in early 2021. “When you see people in a restaurant, you’re often seeing very unguarded moments: people who’ve had an argument, who are on a second date, who are conducting business. Or people getting drunk at nine. I liked the idea of someone really observant watching all of this then thinking about what the lives of these people were really like. It wasn’t a big jump to that’s kind of what a detective does too, picking up clues and thinking about people and their motivations.”

Ajay Chowdhury (left) at the recent Bute Noir festival alongside Trevor Wood, Tim Sullivan
and myself, where we discussed Kamil Rahman in a 'Detectives Overcoming Obstacles' panel

The other reason that he could never get the idea behind The Waiter out of his head, was he really wanted to write about London's East End. “I grew up in Calcutta, and you know Brick Lane, that whole area, I thought was just ripe fodder for a fantastic crime novel. I wanted to see a detective who was a bit more like me. I’d been a fish out of water in London when I first came here, although that was a long time ago. Someone who missed home, who missed the food in Calcutta; all those things came together.”

The result is a truly tasty feast. 

In The Waiter, former Kolkata detective Kamil Rahman is looking for a fresh start, and is waiting tables at the Indian restaurant owned by family friends. Delivering plates of curry to Brick Lane diners and scrubbing away his fall-from-grace. When a birthday party for his boss’s friend ends in murder, Kamil is arm-twisted into an unofficial investigation alongside Anjoli, his boss’s precocious daughter. Their sleuthing brings up bad memories of the Bollywood murder case that ended his career, and Kamil soon finds that while he may have tried to forget his past, it hasn’t forgotten him. Dangerously so.

A fresh and exciting voice on the British crime writing scene, Chowdhury tantalises readers of The Waiter with fascinating characters, intriguing action, and vivid scene-setting; not to mention some mouth-watering food references. Seriously, you’re going to get hungry while reading this book! The debut author deftly juggles dual timelines as murder cases present and past unfold in London and Kolkata, delivering a really delicious debut that certainly left me very keen for seconds! 

Fortunately the series has continued with The Cook, The Detective, and earlier this year, The Spy. 

Have you read The Waiter, or the Kamil Rahman series in general? Do you have any favourite Indian-Bengali dishes that are mentioned in the series? Please share in the comments. 

Male strippers, disabled kids, and naughty schoolgirls: an interview with Ann Bloxwich

Kia ora and haere mai, welcome to the 237th instalment of author interview series, 9mm, which has been resurrected this year after largely going into hibernation and only occasionally emerging in 2021-2023, for a variety of personal reasons.

Thanks for reading and sharing the 9mm series, and Crime Watch in general (and my work elsewhere) over the years. I've had a lot of fun talking to some amazing crime writers and bringing their thoughts and stories to you.

You can check out the full list of of past 9mm interviewees here. What a line-up! With lots more fun to come. Thanks everyone. 

If you've got a favourite crime or thriller writer who hasn't yet been part of the 9mm series, please let me know, and now I'm back on deck more fully, I'll look to make that happen for you. We've got several interviews with cool crime and thriller writers from several different countries 'already in the can' that will be published soon, so lots to look forward to in the coming weeks and months.

Today I'm very pleased to welcome to 9mm someone who's a regular attendee at crime festivals in the UK, and I've seen grow during my years here from keen reader supporting others to an aspiring then published crime writer in her own right: the fabulous Ann Bloxwich! As Ann describes herself on her CWA page, she's: "a short, tattooed crime writer, with a profound love of books, cats, rock music, tea, and cardigans" (she blames Starsky and Hutch for that!). She's previously worked as an Oompa Loompa in a chocolate factory, a night care officer in a residential home, and had her own promotions company which involved male strippers and drag queens, but she gave it all up and moved to Scotland to concentrate on her writing.

I really enjoyed Ann's debut novel, What Goes Around, which introduced a series sleuth that played against common tropes. DI Alex Peachey is a happily married detective, and has a son with Cerebral Palsy and Asperger’s Syndrome, and Ann (who has a disabled child herself) takes readers into the unseen aspects of that life, along with the adult entertainment world, while delivering a gritty crime tale where Peachey is called back from leave to investigate the murder of a woman at a local ladies night.

I'm looking forward to reading the second DI Peachey tale, Goodnight, God Bless, where the detective deals is hunting someone killing paedophiles, whilst also dealing with some serious personal issues. But for now, Ann becomes the latest crime writer to stare down the barrel of 9mm. 

9MM: AN INTERVIEW WITH ANN BLOXWICH

Who is your favourite recurring crime fiction hero/detective?

Crikey, there are a few I love - DI Kim Stone by Angela Marsons, Lincoln Rhyme by Jeffery Deaver, Eddie Flynn by Steve Cavanagh, Carter Blake by Mason Cross, Ali Sinclair by LJ Morris, and Matilda Darke by Michael Wood. They are all flawed in their own way, but do their best to overcome their own demons in order to do the right thing. I also love Victor the assassin from Tom Wood’s books, because he’s a bad guy doing bad things for the right reasons. Bob Hoon is another anti-hero, but an absolute legend in his own right. 

What was the very first book you remember reading and really loving, and why?

I was an Enid Blyton fan when I was young, and I loved The Naughtiest Girl in the School series. I thought boarding school seemed very glamourous, and the meals sounded delicious. Enid Blyton’s books are probably the reason I love food so much!

Before your debut crime novel, what else had you written (if anything) unpublished manuscripts, short stories, articles?

I’d written a couple of short stories which were published in the Crime & Publishment anthologies ‘Happily Never After’ and ‘Wish You Weren’t Here’. When I was working as a promoter and general dogsbody for a group of male strippers, I told one of them I should write a book about some of the exploits they got up to backstage, and he agreed. I didn’t think of it again until I started keeping a journal about my son’s behaviour and how it was affecting me. I thought if I didn’t write it down I might retaliate when he was in one of his rages, and it scared me. I decided to turn my son into a fictional character, and the idea for the book was born.

Outside of writing and writing-related activities (book events, publicity), what do you really like to do, leisure and activity-wise?

I love playing computer games, usually hidden-object mysteries, card games and jigsaw puzzles. I’m not into Fallout, Skyrim or anything like that, but my husband does. I read a lot, and I’m trying to get fitter as I’ve had some health issues recently. Twenty years ago, I was a regular gym bunny, could bench press 160kg and was asked to consider joining the local women’s weightlifting team. Now, I struggle to climb the stairs without needing a lie-down, so I need to get my backside into gear and do something about it.

What is one thing that visitors to your hometown should do, that isn't in the tourist brochures, or perhaps they wouldn’t initially consider?

We have a great theatre which supports a lot of local talent, a local arts centre and some wonderful woods and forests to walk in. Dumfries is known for Robert Burns and JM Barrie, so there are lots of links to them. The river Nith runs through the town, and it’s great to just sit and watch the various wildlife, including a family of otters, who came back and built a home there during the pandemic. 

If your life was a movie, which actor could you see playing you?

According to my daughter, Miriam Margolyes is perfect, because she’s short, round and outspoken. In an ideal world, I’d choose Liv Tyler, because she’s stunning. 

Of your writings, which is your favourite or a bit special to you for some particular reason, and why?

I love the relationship between Alex Peachey and his wife, and how they deal with the darker issues of caring for a disabled child. My own son is in a wheelchair, and although he is loving and friendly, he can also be incredibly violent and destructive. The problems come when you call for help. I’ve had police officers refuse to arrest him, saying things like ‘But he’s in a wheelchair’, or ‘I can’t arrest him, he’s disabled.’ My son used to taunt me with that whenever I threatened to call them. 

What was your initial reaction, and how did you celebrate, when you were first accepted for publication? Or when you first saw your debut story in book form on a bookseller’s shelf?

When I got that first email, I sat and stared at it for half an hour, terrified that if I closed it, it would disappear. When my husband came home from work, I burst into tears before I showed him the email. This was in January 2021, so distancing laws were still in place. One of my friends and fellow writers came round with a bottle of champagne and a cake, but had to leave them by the front door and wave her congratulations at me. It was a bit surreal, but lovely. I’ve never had my books available in shops, but have just become a self-published author and re-released my books, so hopefully now they'll be available more widely.

What is the strangest or most unusual experience you have had at a book signing, author event, or literary festival?

The book came out in July 2021 just before the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, so although I hadn’t got any physical copies, I did have a t-shirt and a bag with a picture of the book on. A lady stopped me and asked if I wrote it. I was pretty nervous, I thought she was going to tell me it was rubbish. She said she wanted to thank me, because her aunt had a disabled son who regularly hit her and, thanks to my book, she now knew she wasn’t alone which made her feel better. It made my day but made me sad at the same time, because so many unpaid carers deal with similar situations but it’s one of those things that people don’t talk about.  

Kia ora, Ann, we appreciate you having a chat with Crime Watch. 

Have you read Ann's DI Peachey novels? Do you like how crime novels can explore real-life issues through the prism of page-turning fictional tales? What are some of your favourites that do that? 

Ankh-Morpork City Watch and Iron Maiden gigs: an interview with MW Craven

Kia ora and haere mai, welcome to the 234th instalment of our long-running author interview series, 9mm - but only the third in the past two or three years. After more than 230 author interviews between 2010-2021, this series largely went into hiatus, for a variety of personal reasons. And Crime Watch itself became far more sporadic.

Looking ahead, I plan to regularly post on Crime Watch once more, at least in terms of reviews and author interviews and awards news etc. Despite all the great content here, I confess Crime Watch needs a revamp and reorganisation, but regardless of 'look', it will continue to shine a light on cool crime and thriller authors and books from all over the world, including back home 'Down Under'. 

Thanks for reading and sharing the 9mm series, and Crime Watch in general (and my work elsewhere) over the years. I've had a lot of fun talking to some amazing crime writers and bringing their thoughts and stories to you. You can check out the full list of of past 9mm interviewees here. What a line-up. 

With lots more fun to come. Thanks everyone. 

If you've got a fave author who hasn't yet been part of the 9mm series, please let me know, and now I'm back on deck more fully, I'll look to make that happen for you.

Following the recent Capital Crime festival, we've got several interviews with cool writers 'already in the can' that will be published soon, so lots to look forward to in the coming weeks and months.

Probation officer turned award-winning author MW Craven

Today I'm very pleased to welcome to 9mm an author who's taken British crime writing by storm in recent years, MW Craven, a welcome working class and 'northern' voice adding fresh perspective and exciting storylines to the local crime scene. I had the pleasure of catching up with Mike offstage at the recent Capital Crime festival, where we had a great chat about his new novel THE MERCY CHAIR for Australian magazine Good Reading, as well as sorting a 9mm author interview for Crime Watch. 

After decades in the Army and Probation Service, punk rock and heavy metal loving storyteller MW Craven scooped the prestigious CWA Gold Dagger in 2019 with his debut, The Puppet Show, which introduced the offbeat crime fighting duo of Cumbrian police detective Washington Poe and mathematical genius, socially awkward civilian analyst Tilly Bradshaw. The fourth novel in that series, Dead Ground, won the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger, and the fifth, The Botanist, scooped last year’s Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. Craven will need quite the mantelpiece! 

His new novel, The Mercy Chair, continues the (mis)adventures of Poe and Tilly, and as Mike told me at Capital Crime, it marks a key turning point in the overall series, and perhaps his darkest book yet. 

But for now, MW Craven becomes the latest author to stare down the barrel of 9mm. 

9MM: AN INTERVIEW WITH MW CRAVEN

Who is your favourite recurring crime fiction hero/detective?

Commander Sam Vimes, Ankh-Morpork City Watch. I’ve been obsessed with Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld for as long as I can remember, and the City Watch books are my very favourites. Most people have Guards! Guards! as their favourite, but I prefer the later Night Watch, as the cast of characters is wide and fully developed. There’s a touch of Vimes in Poe – how could there not be? – and a touch of Captain Carrot in Tilly...

What was the very first book you remember reading and really loving, and why?

Watership Down by Richard Adams. I was given this book by my parents – who encouraged me to read from a very young age – as they’d mistakenly thought that a book about rabbits was suitable reading for an eight-year-old . . . Wrong. It’s barely suitable for an adult. I read it at least once a year.

Before your debut crime novel, what else had you written (if anything) unpublished manuscripts, short stories, articles?

Nothing. Born in a Burial Gown, first published by Caffeine Nights in 2015 (under the name Mike Craven), was the first real thing I had written. And on the back of that I got my agent. I sometimes feel a fraud when I’m talking to fellow authors and they discuss rejection letters etc, as I never had any...

Outside of writing and writing-related activities (book events, publicity), what do you really like to do, leisure and activity-wise?

I collect books – first edition Ed McBains, unusual editions of Watership Down, first edition Stephen Kings, and I’m still trying to complete my first edition hardback collection of the Discworld novels. I’m getting there, but it’s a slow process. Other than that, I read, I socialise with my friends, and I go to gigs. The next two big ones are Stiff Little Fingers in Belfast and Iron Maiden in New York.

What is one thing that visitors to your hometown should do, that isn't in the tourist brochures, or perhaps they wouldn’t initially consider?

They should go to Poe’s local – the Kings Head on Fisher Street (and if they’re lucky, Spun Gold will be on) – and then they should visit my local independent bookshop, Bookends. It’s a smart shop with friendly, knowledgeable staff, but the real gem is the second-hand part of the business, Book Case. I think I’m right in saying that there are 39 rooms in that part of the building.

If your life was a movie, which actor could you see playing you?

Sean Bean. He’s unashamedly northern and this shines through in whatever role he plays. He’s also gruff, no nonsense, sarcastic and craggy. 

Of your writings, which is your favourite or a bit special to you for some particular reason, and why?

I have a soft spot for the second Poe book, Black Summer, as it’s kind of the forgotten novel. It didn’t receive the marketing that The Puppet Show did (which was the debut) and the series didn’t really take off until book three, The Curator. But I like the simplicity of the central concept – a woman Poe knows is dead walks into a police station and proves beyond scientific doubt that she is who she claims to be. How someone can be both dead and alive was such a fun thing to do. It also has that opening chapter...

What was your initial reaction, and how did you celebrate, when you were first accepted for publication? Or when you first saw your debut story in book form on a bookseller’s shelf?

I celebrated with extra chicken when I found out about my first publishing deal (my wife and I were having a Nando’s in Gateshead). I had been hopeful, as Caffeine Nights had been making all the right noises about Born in a Burial Gown, but looking back, we celebrated getting that start-the-ball-rolling email quite stoically. A kind of ‘right, let’s do this’. Little did I know that the email would go on to change my life. I met my future agent the following year and gave him a just printed, not-yet-out, copy of the book, and, after reading it overnight, he asked me to send him the very next book I wrote as an exclusive submission.

What is the strangest or most unusual experience you have had at a book signing, author event, or literary festival?

There are two that stand out – being onstage at Newcastle Noir when a woman collapsed to the floor (she lived, thankfully) and the (won’t name him unless you feed me beer) author who had the mic just carried on talking as if nothing was happening. 

And at Bradford Literary festival in 2018, a woman in the audience repeatedly heckled me, Imran Mahmood and Rebecca Fleet. First, she wanted to know if we had all written the same book. Then, when it came to readings, she heckled again and asked why she, as a respectable woman of impeccable character, should have to listen to extracts from crime books. And finally, she asked why we all couldn’t just talk about Harry Potter instead. Imran and I still laugh about this.

Thanks, Mike, we appreciate you having a chat with us. 

Have you read MW Craven's Poe and Tilly books? Which is your favourite?

"Nails all the steps with aplomb" - review of THE LAST DANCE

THE LAST DANCE by Mark Billingham (Atlantic, 2023)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Meet Detective Miller: unique, unconventional, and criminally underestimated...

A double murder in a seaside hotel sees grieving Detective Miller return to work to solve what appears to be a case of mistaken identity. Will this eccentric, offbeat sleuth find answers where more traditional police have found only a puzzle?

I still remember the day I first discovered (for me) the crime storytelling of British author Mark Billingham. It was a little over 20 years ago, and I was a young attorney browsing the crime and thriller section of a downtown bookshop in New Zealand’s biggest city on my lunch break. Unable to resist, I walked out of the store having bought a copy of Sleepyhead (along with Michael Connelly’s The Poet and James Lee Burke’s Purple Cane Road – a rather successful book buying day!).

While Connelly and Burke were already well established and highly regarded by then, Billingham fair burst onto the scene with his cracking debut Sleepyhead, a twisting and dark British police procedural that remains, for me, one of the very best series-starters of the modern era. So good in fact that its premise was later filched for a key episode of CSI: New York, along with kick-starting a terrific, long-running series starring country music loving, kinda-curmudgeon DI Tom Thorne.

But now, something new, and for Billingham something of a return – or at least nod to and greater inclusion of – his pre-Sleepyhead days when he was most well-known in Britain as a stand-up comedian and an actor who popped up in minor roles in police dramas, as the human face of political puppet show Spitting Image, or as bumbling henchman Gary, a castle guard for the Sheriff of Nottingham in late 1980s-early 1990s kids’ comedy TV show Maid Marian and her Merry Men.

In his first series-starter in two decades, Billingham returns to his comedic roots with the brilliant The Last Dance, a hilarious yet heartfelt crime novel that introduces one-of-a-kind sleuth DS Declan Miller. Back at work following the murder of his wife – a fellow detective and his ballroom dance partner – moped riding Miller is looking to re-find his feet alongside contrasting new partner, in the professional sense, DS Sara Xiu (an enthusiast of motorcycles, heavy metal music, and casual sex).

The duo are tabbed to investigate a bizarre double-killing at a seedy seaside hotel in Blackpool. A local crime family’s eldest son is dead in one room, and an IT consultant is equally sans heartbeat in the adjacent one. Is this a clumsily executed professional hit? As they try to run down leads without making too many missteps, Miller and Xiu quick-step into all sorts of misadventures, while the shadow of his wife’s unsolved murder hovers. Just as she does, appearing regularly in their home.

Where the Thorne series was salted with gallows humour, DS Miller’s investigations have a very different tone; lots of laughs among the dark deeds. The zingy dialogue and Miller’s perspective and quips will have readers smiling, chuckling, even laughing out loud. But this is no one-man show. Other characters, from Xiu to Miller’s eclectic group of ballroom dance buddies, bring much to this highly engaging, well-constructed crime novel. The Last Dance is a vibrant read that still explores some serious topics, from grief to gangsters to various prejudices in our communities.

Billingham is dancing a tricky line, but he nails all the steps with aplomb. If crime writing were Dancing with the Stars, this budding new series would sail through to the next round on a string of 9s and 10s from the judges. And we’d all be left full of anticipation for what’s to come next time the music hits. Thankfully, another DS Miller tale is on the way; The Wrong Hands drops this summer.

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, awards judge, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology series, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.

Review: THE LAST WORD

THE LAST WORD by Elly Griffiths (Quercus, Jan 2024)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Natalka and Edwin are running a detective agency in Shoreham, Sussex. Despite a steady stream of minor cases, Natalka is frustrated, longing for a big juicy investigation to come the agency’s way. Then a murder case turns up. Local writer, Melody Chambers, is found dead and her family are convinced it is murder. Edwin, a big fan of the obit pages, thinks there’s a link to the writer of Melody’s obituary who pre-deceased his subject.

The trail leads them to a slightly sinister writers’ retreat. When another writer is found dead, Edwin thinks that the clue lies in the words. Seeking professional help, the amateur investigators turn to their friend, detective Harbinder Kaur, to find that they have stumbled on a plot that is stranger than fiction.

While prolific British author Elly Griffiths has been delighting readers all over the world with her bestselling Ruth Galloway mysteries over the past fifteen years, she hasn’t been afraid to stray from the coastal Norwich setting or her beloved forensic archaeologist heroine. It was a then-standalone tale, The Stranger Diaries, which scooped the Edgar Award for Best Novel in 2020.

That book introduced DS Harbinder Kaur as a supporting character. Then in between further Ruth Galloway Mysteries, and some of Griffiths other series of Brighton Mysteries, Kaur returned in The Postscript Murders, a novel that was shortlisted for the Gold Dagger and saw the introduction of an unusual investigative trio: octogenarian Edwin, former monk Benedict, and carer Natalka, who is originally from the Ukraine. The amateurs help and hinder Kaur as she tries to uncover the truth behind the death of Natalka’s neighbour, and a potential spate of dying writers.

Now, The Last Word sees a welcome encore for the crew. After the events of the previous book, Benedict, now Natalka’s live-in beau, runs his coffee shop on the southern coast of England, while Natalka and elderly Edwin have opened an agency and dabble in minor investigations day-to-day. But with Natalka’s mother Valentyna having moved into their tiny flat from war-torn Ukraine, while her brother fights the Russians, tensions are high. What they need is a good murder to solve!

When local writer Melody Chambers is found dead and her family suspect foul play, the game is afoot. Especially after Edwin notices strange connections in the obituary pages. When Edwin and Benedict go undercover at a rural writers’ retreat, the body count rises. Are the clues on the page as well as off? Griffiths expertly reels us in, delivering a fabulous tale full of wit, intrigue, and wonderful characters. 

A thoroughly enjoyable read in a growing series, from a masterful storyteller.

Craig Sisterson is a lawyer turned writer, editor, podcast host, and event chair. He's the founder of the Ngaio Marsh Awards, co-founder of Rotorua Noir festival, author of Macavity and HRF Keating Award-shortlisted non-fiction work SOUTHERN CROSS CRIME, series editor of the DARK DEEDS DOWN UNDER anthology, and writes about books for magazines and newspapers in several countries.